remembers the invention of the wheel

Glory Days in Carleton Place- Ray Paquette

Ray Paquette left these comments on my WordPress site yesterday and I had to share as they are very important to keeping our local history alive. Thank you Ray!

The Words of Ray Paquette

I grew up, ages 7 to 12 years old, living in the apartments in the former hotel that is prominent in the first photo (Snedden Hotel). During our youth, we spent a lot of time at the station and not on rare occasions earning the wrath of Mr. Mitchell for climbing the Norway Maples that lined Miguel Street.Mr. Dunphy was in charge of the Express/Baggage as assisted by Mr. Simpson in Express and Joe Hawkins in Baggage. *Mr. Raeburn was the Station Master (he lived on Lake Avenue east in your current home (Springside Hall). Ted Lemaistre worked the telegraph and assisted Mr. Raeburn.

Trains ran through Carleton Place beginning at about 2:30 a.m. with the Trans Continental from the West ending the day about 9:30 p.m. with the final Toronto Pool train.

The Ottawa newspapers arrived in Carleton Place aboard the 4:30 Toronto Pool Train and all the carrier boys congregated in the express area to get their papers for distribution throughout the town. Later Mr. Paul won the contract from the newspaper and delivered the papers to the back of Ernie Foote’s Photography that was on Bridge Street about three doors south of the Queens Hotel.

Author’s Note– I was privileged to meet Mae and her son Bert Raeburn a few times and Mae told me many times that she used to hear the train coming down the tracks which used to be a few 100 feet away and say,“There comes my bread and butter down the track!”

George Giles-–I grew up with Ray Paquette and remember picking up my papers at the station. We spent many hours playing in the area around the station and the old Wool Growers. Enjoy seeing the photos of Carleton Place.

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About lindaseccaspina

Linda Knight Seccaspina was born in Cowansville, Quebec about the same time as the wheel was invented and the first time she realized she could tell a tale was when she got caught passing her smutty stories around in Grade 7 at CHS by Mrs. Blinn.
When Derek "Wheels" Wheeler from Degrassi Jr. High died in 2010, Linda wrote her own obituary. Some people said she should think about a career in writing obituaries.
Before she laid her fingers to a keyboard, Linda owned the eclectic store Flash Cadilac and Savannah Devilles in Ottawa from 1976-1996. After writing for years about things that she cared about or pissed her off she finally found her calling. Is it sex drugs and rock n' roll you might ask? No, it is history. Seeing that her very first boyfriend in Grade 5 (who she won a Twist contest with in the 60s) is the head of the Brome Misissiquoi Historical Society and also specializes in local history back in Quebec, she finds that quite funny.
She writes every single day and is also a columnist for Hometown News and Screamin's Mamas. She is a volunteer for the Carleton Place and Beckwith Heritage Museum, an admin for the Lanark County Genealogical Society Facebook page, and a local guest speaker.
She has been now labelled an historian by the locals which in her mind is wrong. You see she will never be like the iconic local Lanark County historian Howard Morton Brown, nor like famed local writer Mary Cook. She proudly calls herself The National Enquirer Historical writer of Lanark County, and that she can live with.
Linda has been called the most stubborn woman in Lanark County, and has requested her ashes to be distributed in any Casino parking lot as close to any Wheel of Fortune machine as you can get. But since she wrote her obituary, most people assume she's already dead.
Linda has published six books, "Menopausal Woman From the Corn," "Cowansville High Misremembered," "Naked Yoga, Twinkies and Celebrities," "Cancer Calls Collect," "The Tilted Kilt-Vintage Whispers of Carleton Place," and "Flashbacks of Little Miss Flash Cadilac." All are available at Amazon in paperback and Kindle.
Linda's books are for sale on Amazon or at Wisteria · 62 Bridge Street · Carleton Place, Ottawa, Canada, and at the Carleton Place and Beckwith Heritage Museum · 267 Edmund Street · Carleton Place, Ottawa, Canada--Appleton Museum-Mississippi Textile Mill and Mill Street Books and Heritage House Museum and The Artists Loft in Smith Falls.

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I grew up with Ray Paquette and remember picking up my papers at the station. We spent many hours playing in the area around the station and the old Wool Growers. Enjoy seeing the photos of Carleton Place.